


Monsters in the dark

by VanillaMostly



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Headcanon, Missing Scene, POV Minor Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-17
Updated: 2014-02-17
Packaged: 2018-01-12 21:07:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1200592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VanillaMostly/pseuds/VanillaMostly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>None of this was supposed to happen. [Snow's granddaughter's POV]</p>
            </blockquote>





	Monsters in the dark

**Author's Note:**

> Don't own Hunger Games!

 

She went to sleep crying and woke up crying, and still nothing changed. She was locked away in some place cold and alone, and she was hungry and she was dirty and she just wanted _Grandpapa._ “Where is he? Did you kill him?” she asked her occasional visitors. They never answered. They barely looked at her before they shut the door and left again. She hated them. How could they do this to her, to Grandpapa? This was her and Grandpapa’s _home_. What right did they have to come in holding guns, push her roughly around, treat Grandpapa like that? He was the president, the president of Panem!

Of course she had heard of the word “war,” knew what it meant when one side lost and the other side won. She had seen the bombs falling on TV, she had known things were horribly wrong, from the day Grandpapa wouldn’t let her go to school anymore and he wasn’t smiling. He always had a smile for her, his Cleo darling.

But she had never imagined this. None of this was supposed to happen. Next month was her thirteenth birthday. She was going to hold a grand party for all her friends, and Grandpapa was going to take her skiing…

Katniss Everdeen- surely she would do something? Cleo had liked Katniss. She liked Katniss and Peeta. She had wanted to meet them so bad, had begged Grandpapa to invite them to her party last year. Grandpapa hadn’t let her, but that wasn’t Cleo’s fault. If she could meet them now, talk to them… they would know Cleo wasn’t a bad person. They would let her go.

( _The Mockingjay isn’t your friend, stupid,_ the little voice in her head snapped, _she’s_ their _friend._ )

After a while, Cleo stopped crying. She had lost the strength to cry, or to scream, or to feel much of anything. She curled up against the wall, drifting in and out of sleep, not knowing how much time had passed. She wished this room had a window.

The door opened and Cleo didn’t turn around. She knew the person was here to leave her a piece of moldy bread and a glass of water again. Cleo didn’t know which was worse: the food that tasted absolutely _disgusting_ or the humiliation of having to eat it because there was nothing else to eat. The first day or two (or it felt like days, anyway), she refused to touch any of that filth, but then her stomach started hurting and she got dizzy and she couldn’t stand it. She even had to eat with her _hands._ At least no one was here to see that.

This time, however, the familiar sound of a tray sliding through the slot didn’t come.

A voice did.

“Are you Cleona?”

She turned, simply too surprised at being spoken to. On the other side of the glass stood a woman with dark short hair, cut bluntly across her forehead, bright white gauze wrapped around her neck. One arm was in a sling. The fluorescent light did no favors for the bags under her eyes, cuts and burn marks lining her skin, but the woman didn’t act like that bothered her at all. There was a piercing quality in her gaze that made Cleo flinch away.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” the woman said. The softness of her voice surprised Cleo even further. Cleo looked at the woman again, longer this time. It was true that the woman was empty-handed, and that she remained at a respectable distance. She wasn’t wearing the same uniform as the _others_ , either, Cleo noticed. But that didn’t mean anything.

“Who are you?” Cleo asked. She liked that her voice rang out loud and strong. She didn’t sound half as scared as she felt.

“My name is Perri Paylor,” the woman said. “I’m a commander from the districts.”

Cleo frowned. “You don’t look like a Peacekeeper.”

“That’s because I’m not one.”

Cleo blinked.

“I am what you would call a leader of the rebels,” said Paylor.

Usually when Grandpapa talked matters of the state, Cleo didn’t listen. It was just such dreadful _boring_ talk. But even so, she knew enough to pick up instantly on the word “rebels.”

Noting the look on Cleo’s face, Paylor went on.

“I can see that you don’t trust me. I don’t blame you. You are right… I’m not here to save you, I will say that now. But I intend you no harm. The reason I came here has nothing to do with my position as a rebel. I’m here to listen to you, to talk with you, that’s all, as an ordinary person. Do you understand?”

Cleo didn’t understand. The woman had to be lying. She was just tricking Cleo into dropping her guard. Cleo had seen the Games, that was what tributes did. Some of them won like that.

“Why?” Cleo asked. “Why are you here to… just talk to me?”

Paylor pinned Cleo with her direct, steady gaze. “You’re just a child. You’re innocent. You have done nothing to deserve any of this.”

There was a time when Cleo would have made a face and stomped her foot at being called a child, but this wasn’t the time anymore. Cleo had never felt more like a child, huddled in that cold room, cheeks sticky with dried tears, eyes about to well up with renewed tears at the kindest words Cleo had heard since this nightmare began. She bit her lip, but the sniffles came all the same.

“Is there anything I can do for you?” asked Paylor.

“My grandfather,” said Cleo. “Wh-where is he?” Her voice shook as she dreaded to know the answer.

“He’s alive,” said Paylor.

“I want to see him.”

“I’ll see what I can do,” said Paylor. Her eyes flicked to Cleo’s surroundings, which to say wasn’t much. Cleo’s face burned when she saw Paylor looking at the plastic bucket in the corner. “What else can I do for you?”

Cleo didn’t answer, curling up into a ball. _Take me out of here. Can you do that?_

But Paylor had already said she wasn’t here to save her.

No one can.

Cleo thought she heard Paylor sigh. If all of this was a cruel joke - a woman coming here, playing nice, just to get her hopes up and then crush them to laugh in her face - then Paylor was a good actor. Half of Cleo even wanted to believe her… but the other half of her was smart. Grandpapa always said a person would never help another person if they couldn’t get something out of it. The only exception was family. “Family loves you,” he always said. “Family protects you.”

Grandpapa was Cleo’s only family, just as Cleo was his. There had never been a doubt who to believe, Grandpapa or a stranger.

( _Yet he let all of this happen…_ the snide voice said in the back of Cleo’s head.)

She looked up just in time to see Paylor reaching for the door. “Wait!”

Paylor stopped, turning to face her. “Yes?”

“Will they kill me?”

Cleo watched Paylor watching her.

“I want the truth,” added Cleo in a whisper. It still sounded loud, in this small room.

The silence seemed to stretch on forever. Finally, Paylor replied, more gently than before.

“Most likely. Your name is Snow, after all.”

Cleo hadn’t realized she was holding her breath until now. All the air seemed to deflate out of her. She barely registered Paylor shutting the door behind her, footsteps fading. Cleo laid her head down on her arms.

There was nothing to do now but to wait.

 


End file.
